And The Honorary Oscars Go To... Debbie Reynolds, Gena Rowlands, and Spike Lee.
Thursday, August 27, 2015 at 2:28PM No sooner had I published a list of speculation / suggestions for November's Honorary Oscars then the actual awards were announced. (I must have misread the date on the Academy's meeting about this so we've unpublished and will revisit that topic at a more appropriate time.) For now, a hearty congratulations to a satisfying trio of recipients with very different appeals. We're throwing streamers and popping out of (okay eating) cakes this afternoon to celebrate!
Our Oscar Theme Song
All I do... is dream of you... the whole night through
with the dawn... i still go on... and dream of you
you're every thought... you're every thing
you're every song i ever sing
Summer. Winter.... Autumn and Spring
DEBBIE REYNOLDS, "America's Sweetheart" back in her heyday (roughly speaking the 50s through the mid 60s), is your populist choice, not unlike Maureen O'Hara last year. Well liked showbiz legends that were never really critics darlings or in the Oscar hunt competitively can win Honorary Oscars if they stick around long enough. So here's to longevity! Reynolds, who is 83, made her first credited movie appearance in 1950, received her sole Best Actress nomination for the musical The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964)... and has literally never stopped working. This is a true showbiz trouper.
OF NOTE # 1: Carrie Fisher is going to be much in demand for the next several months given a) her mom's Honorary Oscar victory lap, publicity for her new memoir, and her own return to her signature Princess Leia this December in Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens.
OF NOTE # 2: Postcards from the Edge, the thinly veiled Carrie Fisher/Debbie Reynolds comic biopic starring Meryl Streep and Shirley Maclaine hits its 25th anniversary in a couple of weeks and we'll be celebrating that too.
GENA ROWLANDS was a regular Oscar player in her heyday (roughly speaking the late 60s through the early 80s) and is easily your aesthete's choice this year. She's a hugely influential actor and cinephiles have been bemoaning her Oscar losses for years, due in large part to her groundbreaking early indie work with her husband John Cassavettes. She's also worshipped by discerning film buff actors. Consider Tilda Swinton's quote on her film Julia, which was a loose remake of Gena's earlier film Gloria.
One's always downloading one's heroes, I suppose, all the time. I remember being asked whether I thought about Gena Rowlands for "Julia" and thinking 'well, I think about Gena Rowlands all the time!' Not just for 'Julia'.
SPIKE LEE you could safely and cynically call this point in the 2015 honorary triangle their diversity choice but he's also entirely deserving so bless the media for putting so much pressure on Oscar voters to diversify! There's more to cinema than old white men (many of them are worth celebrating, too, but Oscar amply covers that without prodding). What's more, unlike Debbie Reynolds and Gena Rowlands, who couldn't really be called mistreated by the Academy for various reasons, AMPAS truly owes this maverick auteur. His indisputable classic Do The Right Thing (1989), his biopic epic Malcolm X (1992), his late career best 25th Hour (2002), and his biggest hit Inside Man (2006) have a measly 4 Oscar nominations between them with no wins. His only nominations to date were for his documentary 4 Little Girls (1997) and the screenplay of Do The Right Thing which, insane as it may sound, both lost.
AND HERE'S WHERE YOU COME IN DEAR READER...
Last year we did mini-retrospectives on the Honorary winners when we noticed a dearth of coverage on movie sites (for shame) beyond obligatory news posts of the names and the later ceremony. Which films from each of their filmographies would you most like to revisit or discover for the first time with us before the ceremony on November 14th?
Reader Comments (54)
I'm hopelessly behind on Rowland, but would say "Opening Night" tops my to-do list. Reynolds I know far better but haven't gotten around to "Molly Brown" yet, and am fascinated by the idea of "Goodbye Charlie".
These are exciting! Last year's crop pushed me to expand my knowledge of Miyazaki and Carriere (with the help of TFE's intrepid reporting), and this year I'll make my mission to see at least one from each before the Oscars.
For Rowlands, I probably need to see Opening Night most urgently, since it's been so long.
For Lee, do I revisit DTRT or see Malcolm X for the first time? (Or, more likely, do both.)
For Reynolds, I'll let the TFE retrospective columns direct me.
Spike's latter filmography needs first looks and reevaluations. I suggest She Hate Me. Although you'll and others in your camp will complain about the gender politics. I find the premise offensive as a gay person, but you get to see plenty of Anthony Mackie's ass.
"A Woman Under The Influence" is Gena's pinnacle.
As for Lee, I'm a huge fan of "Crooklyn."
And Debbie, well we can't top "Singing in the Rain," can we?
Gena Roland's movie was Gloria, not Julia, and Julia WAS a loose remake of the previous film.
Congrats to these three! They are all deserving of this honor but I STILL can't believe the Academy has pass up Doris Day AGAIN!
All three are greatly deserving, so I don't want to nitpick (especially for Reynolds and Rowlands who are in their 80s), but Spike Lee is 58 and could still win a competitive Oscar, so I don't know why they're giving one to him in 2015.
Doris Day would have been a great choice for the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian award. She's still my number one choice for any Honorary Oscar. (Angelina's win at age 39 still stings btw)
Cicely Tyson should have won an Honorary Oscar this year, and the award would have satisfied the Academy's new need to diversify after the #OscarsSoWhite fiasco. Tyson is 91 for Christ's sake, and she steals every movie and scene she's in to this day.
And just because there are no old white guys represented, how about giving one to 90-year-old Hal Holbrook? He's always a welcome presence in movies going all the way back to the 1950s.
I believe that Doris Day wouldn't come to accept the Oscar, that's why they don't give it to her. But it's only a guess.
Pleased for Reynolds and Rowlands. Spike Lee is uninteresting, although I like Summer Of Sam.
I would have loved either Max Von Sydow, Liv Ullmann or either of Catherine Deneuve or Jeanne Moreau.
Spike Lee is 58 and could still win a competitive Oscar, so I don't know why they're giving one to him in 2015.
Because he's not winning a competitive Oscar Sean. He is one of those auteurs who does not make Academy friendly movies even when he goes prestige.
The trio of foreign goddesses should me soon too: Jeanne Moreau, Liv Ullmann, and Catherine Deneuve.
I also agree I think Day keeps missing because she keeps turning it down.
Gena Rowlands in Opening Night is probably among my top 5 favorite performances of all time.
Interesting that Reynolds's award is the Jean Hersholt - while I find her vocation around mental health issues inspiring, I wouldn't immediately think of her as a humanitarian. (Her tireless work for motion picture conservation was what I wish the Academy had prioritized in their press release.)
I would like to revisit Spike Lee's BAMBOOZLED and SHE HATE ME to see if they're really as bad as I remember.
To dig up some tabloid history (not that it was buried deep) for a footnote, Reynolds' "love rival" Elizabeth Taylor won the same humanitarian award in 1993. It sort of goes to show that everybody got theirs in that situation, except for Eddie Fisher.
Also, perhaps that gives hope to Jennifer Aniston in 40 years.
*considering Angelina Jolie just won the prize #precedent
@3rtful - You're right that he doesn't make Academy-friendly movies, but he also hasn't made anything worth honoring in a while, so maybe the Academy thinks they better give him one now before he diminishes his filmography any further. There's also the fact that African American males have shorter lifespans than their white counterparts (just under 72 years of age on average). And NBA-great Darryl Dawkins just died today at age 58. Still, you can't tell me Charles Burnett wouldn't have been a more interesting choice if we wanted to go with an African American filmmaker. Burnett is 71.
Chuck - you're so right. UGH. that announcement and wasted hours on the first post really threw me off today. corrected.
Great choices this year by the academy, I feel the obvious choices are Women Under the influence, Singin' in the Rain and Do the Right Thing but while each of those films are magnificent I feel if your going to cover the three looking into there lesser seen projects would be the more fun. For Rowlands I suggest something outside her magnificent work with her late husband and instead revisit Woody Allen's greatest drama Another Woman where Rowlands is front and centre and as always magnificent. For Lee I feel Jungle Fever isn't talked about as much and would be interesting to discuss. Finally for Debbie Reynolds while the dream is to go over Will & Grace she's winning for her film work so the obscure choice for me would be In & Out. A guilty pleasure film for me.
My favorite Spike Lee movie is 25th Hour. It's so interesting in how it documents NYC immediately post-9/11. I think it would be a good one to revisit.
As for Gena, I just saw Opening Night for the first time and loved it. But maybe a post on her recent film work would be welcome, too? I've been meaning to see Unhook the Stars, where she costars with Tomei.
While A Woman Under the Influence is Rowlands most iconic role, I think Opening Night is my favorite performance of hers. I would've given her Oscars for both.
This joyful announcement mediates somewhat the ridiculously low number of Oscar nominations Gena has. She should at least have been nominated for supporting for Once Around.
Unsinkable Monly Brown!!
Sean, Spike's lifespan was not on the table when they decided to acknowledge him. He is the most celebrated African-American filmmaker of all time. Burnett is an under the radar auteur who will never be lionized outside of a niche audience.
adelutza -- we always hear that as the reason they haven't honored Doris Day and yet they knew that Jean Luc Godard wasn't going to show up and they gave him one. so i'm guessing it's a combo of the, not being totally devoted to the idea and her unwillingness to show up.
Agee with all the choices but a couple of the ones not so often talked about are;
A Catered Affair - Miss Reynolds
Minnie and Moskowitz - Miss Rowlands
And I am perhaps one of the few who Like the Miracle of St Anna by Spike Lee
All these films benefit from great ensemble casts
Congrats to all the winners. I actually have a lengthy post examining Spike Lee's career set for tomorrow so this is perfect timing.
Well I'm tickled for Gena and Debbie it's about damn time for both to get their due! Looking forward to both of their acceptance speeches.
I think Doris's chronic failure to be honored must have some relation to her resistance or perhaps outright refusal to participate in attending the awards ceremony. There can't be any other fathomable reason.
Spike Lee is deserving but something about youngish still active artists being selected for honorary awards seems wrong when it means that they are taking the slot that someone along the lines of Albert Finney, Glynis Johns or Cicely Tyson all of who are madly deserving and whose main career is behind them are ignored. These cannot be award posthumously people!
For review for Debbie: Singin’ in the Rain is great and all but it has been examined to death! I’d love a closer look at work of hers that was deserving of a nomination but wasn’t acknowledged such as The Catered Affair, The Rat Race and the one that looked like it was going to bring her back to the table-Mother. As well as some of her better but lesser known films like The Pleasure of His Company with Fred Astaire, Mary, Mary, This Happy Feeling and The Mating Game.
Gena is always glorious but a look at the under known Opening Night, Unhook the Stars, Minnie and Moskowitz, Love Streams and perhaps some of the really interesting things she’s done on TV Strangers: The Story of a Mother and Daughter with Bette Davis, An Early Frost and so much more.
I’m not very familiar with Lee’s work but I did love Inside Man and 25th Hour.
Marvelous compilation of worthies that you had up before Nathaniel by the way. I'm still hoping that Charlotte Rampling, not even a single nomination to her name!!! GGGRRRRRRRR, may pull off a nomination this year for 45 Years. Give that woman her due, damn it!
3rtful, You can't tell me they weren't thinking about how old Spike Lee is right now since the Honorary Oscar is the Academy's equivalent of a Lifetime Achievement Award. Also, the Academy seems to think the Governors' Awards are strictly for a niche audience since they don't even televise the event. And anyway, Burnett may be unknown to the average moviegoer, but so are recent Honorary Oscar winners like documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker, film historian Kevin Brownlow and studio exec John Calley. My point is, Spike Lee is deserving of an Oscar, but it could have waited a few more years while they honor people like Doris Day, Cicely Tyson, Hal Holbrook or any other 80+ year-old.
...and will these three great artists appear on the actual Oscars show?
Hooray!
I nominate Gloria, Crooklyn, and Tammy and the Bachelor.
Reynolds and Rowland deserve it.
A re-watch of Spike's debut "She's Gotta Have It" would be fun.
Nothing to add to the suggestions already made for Reynolds and Rowlands.
Love all three selections, actually! I'm not the biggest Reynolds fan (if she and Julie Andrews had've made a movie back in the day I would never watch it), but she's a spunky personality so good on her. THey probably saw the fun she injected into the... SAG awards? Was it the SAG Awards where she got a lifetime achievement recently?
As for Spike, I don't have a problem with it. He *is* nearly 60, seems to be venturing more towards very niche indie works (Da Sweet Blood of Jesus was awful, but whatever) and after last year I can see them mulling about who to give it to. Is Cicely Tyson not "cinema" enough, I wonder?
For mine, his best films are Do the Right Thing, She's Gotta Have It (still so remarkably fresh), Bamboozled and Malcolm X, although I have yet to catch Crooklyn.
FUCK YES bitch!
about time Gena Rowlands has an Oscar after that abomination of a loss for A Woman under The Influence. So happy!
I wouldn't mind seeing the production design of The Tender Trap again, but my first thought for Debbie was the same as a lot of people - The Catered Affair. Though Molly Brown should be the most fun after Singin In The Rain.
I've always wanted to see Faces and never have, so what the heck, I'll throw in my vote for that for a Gena movie.
And when I saw Spike Lee's name, my first thought was that he must be ill, and no one knows about it. Let's hope that's not true. I think he's a little young for this too, but is certainly worthy of it I suppose. I remember thinking about half of Mo Better Blues was great, and the rest was awful. I'd love to see it again just to figure out why I thought that. I also recall Crooklyn as being rather sweet and easy to rewatch.
Carl Roth -- Congrats!
Sean, under the radar black film talent will never be thought of the same as their white counterparts. Hence when the Academy decides to honor black talent they go for the big names. And white online commentators still find away to bitch about them either for someone white or someone black who would never be considered to begin with.
BAMBOOZLED is definitely worth a revisit...I remember thinking it was seriously underrated at the time it came out (though it does kind of unravel in the last act).
Interesting choices, Gena Rowlands is the platinum standard for good acting, any of her films are interesting. Aside from the obvious "Woman under the Influence", I would suggest either "Gloria" or "Another Woman".
Debbie Reynolds is pure Hollywood and I have no problem with this choice. "The Unsinkable Molly Brown" is surely the best choice since it represents just how unsinkable she has been all through her career.
Spike Lee is a bit young but I think this may be Hollywood's white guilt kicking in. Please take another look at "Malcolm X" or "Inside Man" - 2 great but different performances by Denzel Washington. Also his documentaries on Katrina - "When the Levees Broke" really described the situation and broke my heart while watching.
So many other worthy choices for honourees - , Donald Sutherland, Glynis Johns, Albert Finney, Jeanne Moreau, Liv Ullmann, and Catherine Deneuve. Is there some sort of waiting list?
Spike's 25th Hour is an underrated classic!
A Woman Under The Influence is mandatory in my opinion, because that is the movie cited by every actressexual as the one that Gena should have an Oscar for.
Singin' in the Rain or The Unsinkable Molly Brown.
Do The Right Thing or Malcolm X or Jungle Fever.
I loved Gena Rowlands in Another Woman - also a very underrated Woody Allen film. I love her opening and closing narration scenes. "My name is Marion Post..."
DTRT is the masterpiece but She's Gotta Have It deserves a spotlight; it's where it all began and, when stacked against his other films, is the least self-conscious and most enjoyable. That rape scene haunts him till this day (his regret is on the record) and I find the predatory lesbian character just as problematic. Add in an ebony-hued Black female lead (still rare today) and the controversy (well, more like fake outrage) surrounding a woman daring to express herself sexually in ways only men are allegedly supposed to, and you'll have one fascinating discussion.
Because I'm a most cliche man, I'd love to see Singin' in the Rain, A Woman Under the Influence, and Do the Right Thing all revisited. They're all the movies where I find each of them at their best.
OK, mayyyyybe Halloweentown for Reynolds.
Reynolds in Divorce American Style! And just give Doris Day her Oscar! let her do a video acceptance,,,
She Deserves it!
Lee... Do the Right Thing
Rowlands ... Opening Night
Reynolds ..Catered Affair
Doris Day lives in the Carmel Highlands and we live in Carmel, Ca ... recently she celebrated her 90th birthday and went to it at a popular restaurant/hotel .. her picture from the event was in our local paper and she looks quite good... I think she was really done with Hollywood when she left... had a huge misfortune that, I think, really soured her
Hands down, Anjelica Huston for her performance as Lily in The Grifters with a 2nd choice for Annnette Benig for the same plus The Kids are Alright (another 1st place for that one)
Tom -- ???
Misspelled Annette's family name, sorry, it's Bening. Tom Fletcher